It has been reported that Prime Minister Mark Carney has recently created a new Ministry in Canada—he has chosen former journalist Evan Solomon to be the new Minister of AI and Digital Innovation. Solomon was elected for the first time in the April 28, 2025 election in the riding of Toronto Centre. Before that, he worked as a broadcaster for both CBC and CTV.

Previously, the topic of AI fell under the industry portfolio—in the Trudeau government, the person who was responsible for something like Bill C-27 (it contained both a privacy and AI proposed piece of legislation) was François-Philippe Champagne, who is now responsible for Finance and is representing the riding of Saint-Maurice. As Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry from 2021 to 2025, he helped attract major investments into Canada, advanced the development and adoption of clean technologies, strengthened research and development, and bolstered Canada’s position in environmental sustainability.

What Will the New AI Minister Do?

As we have recently seen, Prime Minister Carney has announced his single mandate letter with some streamlined top priorities:

1. Establishing a new economic and security relationship with the United States and strengthening our collaboration with reliable trading partners and allies around the world

   
   

2. Building one Canadian economy by removing barriers to interprovincial trade and identifying and expediting nation-building projects that will connect and transform our country

   
   

3. Bringing down costs for Canadians and helping them to get ahead

   
   

4. Making housing more affordable by unleashing the power of public-private cooperation, catalysing a modern housing industry, and creating new careers in the skilled trades

   
   

5. Protecting Canadian sovereignty and keeping Canadians safe by strengthening the Canadian Armed Forces, securing our borders, and reinforcing law enforcement

   
   

6. Attracting the best talent in the world to help build our economy, while returning our overall immigration rates to sustainable levels

   
   

7. Spending less on government operations so that Canadians can invest more in the people and businesses that will build the strongest economy in the G7

No, AI is not mentioned in there. However, in the preamble of the letter, he touched on AI when he stated:

“The combination of the scale of this infrastructure build and the transformative nature of artificial intelligence (AI) will create opportunities for millions of Canadians to find new rewarding careers – provided they have timely access to the education and training they need to develop the necessary skills.

Government itself must become much more productive by deploying AI at scale, by focusing on results over spending, and by using scarce tax dollars to catalyse multiples of private investment.”

Who is the New Minister of AI and Digital Innovation—Evan Solomon?

To many, including Ottawa Law professor Michael Geist, Evan Solomon is smart and tech savvy—exactly what Canada needs to move the ball rolling in AI.

In the past, Solomon was the CBC host of Power and Politics on CBC and The House podcast on Radio Canada. He was even considered to be someone who could replace Peter Mansbridge on The National. However, CBC terminated him in 2015 after the Star reported that he was taking secret commission payments from wealthy  art buyers related to art sales involving people that he dealt with as a host. Apparently, he took commissions of more than $300,000 for several pieces of art and did not disclose to the buyer that he was being paid fees for introducing buyer and seller. Some of the people that he dealt with included Jim Balsillie and Mark Carney himself.

What’s more, Solomon’s appointment was met with criticism, mostly because he does not have a formal science or tech background, and also because of a mishap in March when he briefly reposted a photoshopped offensive image of Carney from a parody account. In fact, some critics argue that someone who could not identify manipulated content in his own social media feed may struggle to develop effective policies to protect Canadians from increasingly sophisticated AI-generated deception.

But he is back now, as AI Minister. He will have a lot of work to do in his new role, and we hope that one thing he does is deal with the introduction of a good-quality Canadian AI law.

What Can we Take from the Mandate Letter?

We heard Prime Minister Carney talk about AI in his election platform, where he promised to make sure Canada takes advantage of the opportunities presented by AI, since it is critical for our competitiveness as the global economy shifts—and for making sure we have a government that actually works.

More specifically, he promised to do the following in the area of AI under the build portion of the platform:

• Build AI infrastructure. The Prime Minister had planned on investing in nation-building energy infrastructure and cutting red tape to make Canada the best place in the world to build data centres. Canada must have the capacity to deploy the AI of the future and ensure we have technological sovereignty. Also, he planned on building the next generation of data centres quickly and efficiently by leveraging federal funding and partnering with the private sector to secure Canada’s technological advantage

• Invest in AI training, adoption, and commercialization. The Prime Minister had planned on measuring growth by tracking the economic impacts of AI in real-time so we can proactively help Canadians seize new opportunities, boost productivity, and ensure no one is left behind. Also, he planned on boosting adoption with a new AI deployment tax credit for small and medium-sized businesses that incentivizes businesses to leverage AI to boost their bottom lines, create jobs, and support existing employees. Companies would leverage a 20 percent credit on qualifying AI adoption projects, as long as they can demonstrate that they are increasing jobs. Further, he planned on catalyzing commercialization by expanding successful programs at Canada’s AI institutes (Mila, Vector, Amii) so that we can connect more Canadian researchers and startups with businesses across the country, which will supercharge adoption of Canadian innovation in businesses, create jobs, and strengthen our AI ecosystem

• Improve AI procurement. Prime Minister Carney had planned on establishing a dedicated Office of Digital Transformation at the centre of government to proactively identify, implement, and scale technology solutions and eliminate duplicative and redundant red tape. This will enhance public service delivery for all Canadians and reduce barriers for businesses to operate in Canada, which will grow our economy. This is about fundamentally transforming how Canadians interact with their government, ensuring timely, accessible, and high-quality services that meet Canadians’ needs. Also, he planned on enabling the Office of Digital Transformation to centralize innovative procurement and take a whole-of-government approach to service delivery improvement. This could mean using AI to address government service backlogs and improve service delivery times, so that Canadians get better services, faster.

There were some great ideas in the election platform, and I’m sure that Canadians hope that they will manifest. It is important to note that the priorities that were identified in the election platform are encouraging, as they will help both government and SMBs in the private sector with tax credits that incentivizes businesses to leverage AI to boost their bottom lines, create jobs, and support existing employees. Businesses could sure use some help with training existing employees via upskilling and reskilling, as well as AI literacy.

With respect to the more general mandate letter that has recently surfaced, it is possible that this means that any additional and prescribed mandate letters to individual Ministers will not be shared with the public. That would be concerning, since public-facing mandate letters have become the norm during the Trudeau government. We will have to see on this issue.

Moreover, the couple of paragraphs in the mandate letter’s preamble suggests that there will be targeted improvements for both the public and private sectors. The letter emphasized training and scaling AI. These goals are lofty, but necessary. 

But on the whole, things are looking promising given the commitment to build, invest, and improve AI procurement.

What can Canadians Expect?

In my view, it is still too early to tell. But I’m hoping that Prime Minister Carney comes through for Canada. If the government gets this right, Canada could catch up to other jurisdictions like the EU, and become a real leader in AI.